I would like to thank Anne Cater and Weidenfeld & Nicolson for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher – Weidenfeld & Nicolson

Published – out now

Price – £14.99 Hardback £7.99 Kindle eBook

BUENOS AIRES, 1981.
Argentina is in the grip of a brutal military dictatorship.
Inspector Joaquín Alzada's work in the Buenos Aires police force exposes him to the many realities of life under a repressive regime: desperate people, terrified people and - worst of all - missing people.
Personally, he prefers to stay out of politics, enjoying a simple life with his wife Paula. But when his revolutionary brother Jorge is disappeared, Alzada will stop at nothing to rescue him.

TWENTY YEARS LATER...
The country is in the midst of yet another devastating economic crisis and riots are building in the streets of Buenos Aires.
This time Alzada is determined to keep his head down and wait patiently for his retirement. But when a dead body lands in a skip behind the morgue and a woman from one of the city's wealthiest families goes missing, Alzada is forced to confront his own involvement in one of the darkest periods in Argentinian history - a time of
collective horror and personal tragedy.

Alternating between two key moments in the life of a man and his country, Repentance is a noir with a difference, featuring an unforgettable character on a quest to solve a case that offers both a painful reminder of all he has lost and a last chance at redemption.

Thrillers and their use of the police has a long history. Certainly, for UK crime novels as the time of the consulting detective has largely passed the role of the formal investigator has tended to wear a uniform of some form. There is now a debate about how crime novels use the police who are given so much power by the state to arrest, investigate and ultimately imprison – are thrillers not perhaps giving that power and it’s abuse full scrutiny? The role of police elsewhere is something beyond the US we tend to ignore in the UK but in Repentance by Eloisa Diaz that duality between the police being seen as both part of the justice system and also part of the state’s own power gets explored in a really compelling way linked to one of the most terrible recent abuses of state power in decades.

In the Argentina of 2001 Inspector Joaquin Alzada is counting the days until he can retire but has been recently advised that thanks to the worsening economic climate of the country that is not an option the state government will permit. His day is further soured by the discovery of a dead woman dumped behind the morgue. He is reluctantly forced to investigate who the woman is. At the same time one of the wealthiest families in Buenos Aires has asked the police to help find a missing young member of the family who never returned her sister’s call. Alzada knows the rich family must take precedence even if his young and very inexperienced Estratico seems a little too keen to jump in with both feet. But this case and the rising political temperature of a country once again on the edge of civil unrest is reminding Joaquin of 1981 when Argentina was under a brutal right-wing regime; where if you became known to be an enemy you would join the many thousands of ‘the disappeared’ and never be seen again. Joaquin at that time had just started as a police detective while his younger brother Jorge has grown increasingly militant as the government has grown even crueller. Is the past about to repeat itself?

This was an absolutely fascinating read and very much a character study of how a person can change due to the events they live in and have to face. When we first meet Alzada we find a man in his sixties who clearly is out of love with his job but yet shows impatience with anyone who wants to refer to the deceased as an ‘it’. This is a story unwrapping the mystery of what makes Joaquin Alzada tick and possibly what may make him put his head above the parapet again. The key to this is the story switching narratives between 2001 and 1981 exploring the similarities and differences between an Argentina that is on the brink of the government calling for a crackdown on protestors and one that has already passed that point and wields absolute deadly power that no one can question unless they too become an enemy of the state. The 2001 scenes feel pressured and murky but the 1981 scenes drip with fear and menace.

Diaz achieves this atmosphere by making us understand Joaquin’s relationship with his brother. Initially both quite militant Joaquin opted to join the police a few years prior to the coup but has stayed in his role and developed a policy of not looking too closely at what is going on around him – even though he knows the truth. Jorge however needles his older brother and questions his decisions while he has moved closer to the resistance movements. It could have been a very simple tale of two brothers making good and bad choices but Diaz makes us realise that Joaquin has been doing his upmost to protect his brother and their young family, but his luck may be running out. When it doe and we see the impact the state can quickly and quietly inflict on those it deems a pest without any repercussions it’s done brutally chilling but it underlines exactly how dangerous a country that drops all democratic norms really is. At this point every conversation and action all carry huge danger for Joaquin and his family leading to quite a hard revelation about what happened twenty years earlier and what this meant for the family ever since. Diaz also highlights what Joaquin’s wife Paul was doing at the time and while initially they seemed a couple at odds with each other we see a much more complex relationship develop.

The 2001 scenes expand on these revelations and we see friendships that died and also a growing tension between Joaquin and Jorge’s own son Sorolla that is bristling and repeating some of the arguments Jorge used at the time as history repeats itself. Some of this may be reawakening Joaquin’s own sense of justice and making him take risks his boss would never approve of with his new case. My only caveat is the crime that sets these scenes in motion feels a little underplayed and I’d had liked a little more investigation and tying up of this plot thread as well than what we get towards the end. Despite that I loved the double act that evolves between the charming yet grumpy Joaquin and his apparently by the book deputy who may have some hidden depths as they start to get the measure of one another.

This is a story about when is the right time to do the right thing and although quite a downbeat novel exploring Argentina’s dark past it does have rays of hope for the future. For me as a UK reader it really cast a light on a time that I knew very little about and also made me think about how the role of police changes with our own democratic ideals or their descent into right wing populism. A hugely impressive debut and I would not be averse to revisiting this inspector again to find out more secrets of the past and what happened next. Highly recommended!